by Merry Jones
“You must be nervous. I mean, at least a little.”
What? Was she reading my mind?
“It’s not every day that you get married.”
Oh, that. “I can’t tell. I’m kind of numb.”
“Numb?” She considered it. “Okay. Numb’s good.” She grinned. Her teeth were perfect. Absolutely flawless, bright white. I didn’t remember ever noticing how straight they were. “Here’s to numb.”
We drank together. My tea was tepid, tasteless.
“You know.” She was sloshed. “I ought to warn you. Being married to someone is no small thing. It’s like two corporations merging: You don’t just get the assets; you get the liabilities, too. The whole kit and kaboodle.” She leaned over, whispering, “For example. You know what Tim does? It’s actually kind of cute. Every single day, after the shower, in his birthday suit, he flexes. In the mirror. He poses, you know, like a bodybuilder.” She imitated a stance or two. I closed my eyes, not wanting to know Tim so well, imagining his belly.
Susan went on about things Tim did, and I tried not to listen, to let her presence and the steadiness of her voice soothe me. Okay, maybe I wasn’t entirely numb. I did have some jitters. But the bottles behind the bar glowed softly amber in the light, and liquid sounds of the fountain blended with the gentle strokes of the harpist in the corner. I sat with my friend and drifted, becoming mellow.
Suddenly, Susan nudged me. “Don’t look behind you.”
Immediately, I turned to look behind me.
“Dammit, I said don’t.”
Too late. A bald, mustached man at the end of the bar caught my eye and winked. He wore a large diamond on his pinkie, a gray silk tie.
I turned back to Susan and took a sip of cool tea, pretending not to have noticed him. “He’s flirting?” He was. With us. The idea amazed me.
“Don’t look so surprised. We’re babes.” She picked up her purse. “Think Tim would mind?”
“Too bad if he does. What’s good for the goose …” I was joking, but Susan slipped off her stool and began to walk down the bar. I grabbed her arm. “Wait. You’re not serious—”
“Going to the ladies’.”
Susan teetered away, leaving me alone with our drinks, the bowl of mixed nuts, the bartender and the bald-headed winker. I avoided eye contact. I stared at the bottles against the wall, the brass apron at the bar, my hands, my teacup, but the eyes of the mustached gentlemen remained fixed on me. I felt them drilling holes into my face. Finally, I swiveled away so my back was to him and noticed Eli’s photo album on the stool beside me.
“Another round?” The bartender was Polynesian, maybe Hawaiian. Or Filipino? His skin was smooth, his face round and friendly.
Yes, I nodded. Of course, another round. I was getting married in less than twenty hours, and my fiance was off somewhere getting a lap dance. Might as well live it up, have a second cup of tea.
“It’s from the gentleman at the end of the bar.” The bartender tried not to smirk.
I glanced at the man. He saluted. Saluted? I nodded, smiled a hasty thank-you and looked away, not knowing what to do next. Where was Susan? What was keeping her? What was I supposed to do? I grabbed the album and opened it, hiding within its pages, trying to lose myself in photos of my children smiling and playing. Yes. And there were Tony and Sam. And Nick with Sam. And Nick with Molly. I turned the pages, thinking about how good a photographer Eli was, how he captured the essence of people. Mood, fleeting expressions.
There was a whole page of Oliver. Oliver lying on his back, paws in the air. Oliver smiling. Oliver with a ball in his mouth. Where had Eli been when he’d taken them? The next page had several shots of me. In one, I was holding hands with Nick, standing in front of the house. When had that happened? And how come we hadn’t spotted Eli? And below it, there was a wide shot of me walking with Luke down South Street. The opposite page had a closer view of the same walk. As I turned the page, goose- flesh was rising on my arms before I realized why.
Go back, I thought. Look at those photos again. I hesitated, suddenly cold and no longer the least bit mellow. Slowly, deliberately, I turned the page back. There we were, Luke in the stroller and me pushing him down South Street, approaching the corner of Fifth Street. Which was where Bryce Edmond had been hit. In fact, Bryce must have been running after me at that very moment, because my head was turned toward the street; probably I’d just heard him call my name. At the moment Eli took the picture, Bryce was still conscious, still unharmed. But in seconds he was to be slammed by a car, his head smashed against concrete. I stared at the picture, wishing I could freeze time and yell to him to stop or turn back. But by the time Eli had snapped the camera, it was probably too late even to yell. Because in the corner of the shot was the dashboard of a silver SUV And sitting in the drivers seat, small but clear as the vodka in Susan’s Black Russian, was a woman who looked a whole lot like Bonnie Osterman.
SEVENTY
OH GOD, THERE WAS no doubt. It was. Bonnie Osterman. I stared, squinting, at the photo, processing the implications. Bonnie Osterman had been driving the car that hit Bryce Edmond. Bonnie Osterman, in fact, was in the background of several photographs. She was on a bench in Three Bears Park while I watched Molly climb the jungle bars. And she’d been half out of the frame, a bit out of focus, in a shot in which Molly, seated on the front steps of the house, was holding Luke.
I couldn’t move. I sat stock-still, my bones frozen. Bonnie Osterman had been following me. Bonnie Osterman, who’d cut pregnant women open to steal their infants, who’d made stews out of unborn children—Bonnie Osterman had been on my street, to my house. She’d seen my children—oh God. I saw Agent Harris lying gutted on my patio. Maybe it hadn’t been a terrorist or spy or weapons dealer who’d killed her, after all. Maybe— Someone brushed my shoulder; I jumped. “I didn’t mean to startle you.” The mustached man was taking a seat on the stool next to mine. “Mind if I join you?”
I must have looked frightful, because when I faced him, he ducked ever so slightly, as if shocked. I think I asked him what time it was. Or I might have said I had to get out of there, or maybe I didn’t say anything. I don’t remember. But I do remember pulling out my cell phone and calling home. And I remember listening to the phone ring, unanswered, until the voice mail picked up.
The man asked something, probably if everything was okay I looked at him, trying to figure out what he was saying, what it meant that nobody answered my phone. And then, grabbing Eli’s album, I jumped off my bar stool and ran.
I was dashing out of the Fountain Restaurant as Susan was coming back in, still wobbly. She opened her mouth to say something, but I cut her off.
“I’ve got to get home.”
She did a tipsy about-face and chased after me, asking questions. But I didn’t stop.
“I’ll call you later,” I yelled over my shoulder as I raced through the lobby to the front door. “Cab,” I told the doorman, and he waved one forward. I jumped in and gave him the address, telling him to hurry, as baffled and boozy Susan spilled out the revolving door.
“Zoe—are you okay?” she shouted. “What happened?”
There was no time, of course, to explain. So I simply waved to her through the window as the cab pulled away
SEVENTY-ONE
I COULDN’T BREATHE. I was drowning, swirling. all I could think of was Luke and Molly. And the hunched, squat figure of Bonnie Osterman. In the cab, I called Nick on his cell, but, of course, he didn’t pick up. He wasn’t reachable; he was busy sticking money into the thongs of stripteasers. I left a message for him to come home.
It was maybe three miles from the Four Seasons to our house on Monroe Street, but the cab seemed to crawl and to get every red light. At that hour, there was no traffic. No oncoming cars. No cops.
“I’m in a hurry.” The red light lasted forever. “Can’t we go through?”
“You want me to lose my license?” The very idea infuriated him. “I can’t break the laws, ma’a
m. You want someone to break laws, you find another cabbie. Not me.” He gestured as if I could get out if I had a complaint.
I tried to calm down. “Okay. It’s just that my baby is sick and I have to get home.” The second part wasn’t a lie.
He turned, glanced at me and, looking both ways to check for cars, floored it. “Your baby? A boy or a girl?” We passed Market Street, headed toward Chestnut. Another red light.
“A little boy.”
“And why did you leave your little boy alone? What are you doing out so late all by yourself?”
Why was he interrogating me? Did he know I’d lied? Was he judging me, finding it unacceptable for a woman to be out late alone? “He’s not alone. My mother’s with him, and I just left my husband at a dinner party.” More whoppers. Why was I lying? What did I care what the cabdriver thought? No one had answered the phone at my house, and Bonnie Osterman knew where we lived, had seen my children. My stomach and heart had exchanged places, fluttering and pounding out adrenaline-soaked panic. At the thought of Luke, milk seeped into my bra. My entire body ached to feel his soft cheeks, to touch Molly’s curls. Oh God, my children.
“Okay, miss.” The driver seemed, if not to approve of me, at least to accept the gravity of my plight. “Sick baby boy, here comes Mommy.”
We flew through a red light at Walnut, again at Spruce. He spun onto Pine Street on what seemed to be two wheels and sped from Sixteenth all the way to Fourth Street, where he turned again. The whole ride lasted only a few minutes but seemed eternal, and when we arrived in front of my house on Monroe, I pulled a twenty out of my bag, couldn’t wait for change. The driver was happy.
“Good luck with your baby boy, miss. I think he’ll be fine.”
But I was already hurrying up the front steps, key in hand. Holding my breath, I flung the door open and rushed inside. A lamp was on in the living room, so I headed that way, and from halfway down the hall, to my relief, I saw Anna seated in the wingback chair.
Thank God. Probably she’d been in the bathroom when I’d called. Or checking on Luke, so she couldn’t get to the phone in time. Probably I’d gone crazy over nothing.
“Hi, Anna. I’m back.” I tried to sound chirpy and casual. “How did your evening go? The kids okay?”
Anna said nothing as I stepped into the living room, still chattering with relief. “Did Molly like the pizza? How late did she stay up?”
But Anna still didn’t answer; Anna didn’t even move. And as I came closer, in the lamplight, I realized why. One side Anna’s skull was crushed. Completely smashed in. Anna was dead.
SEVENTY-TWO
I BACKED AWAY ON wobbly legs, trying to make sense of what I was seeing, fear pulsing, instinct overtaking reason. I didn’t think, didn’t hesitate.
“Molly!” The scream came from my belly, sounded deep like a roar. “Molly?”
I wheeled around, flung myself out of the room, into the hall. I raced into the dining room, my office, turning on lights, searching and finding no one. Hearing nothing but my own thundering cries. Then, somehow, I was upstairs, raging into Molly’s empty room and then to Luke’s and switching on the overheads to find abandoned, rumpled beds. Molly’s pillows had fallen on the floor; Luke’s dinosaur comforter lay alone in his crib. There was not a trace of Molly or Luke, though. They were simply, completely gone.
I couldn’t stop the wailing sound, couldn’t straighten up. I was bent over in physical pain, holding my belly, dropping to my knees. Bonnie Osterman had been here, had attacked Anna. The monster whose backyard had been full of tiny bones, whose freezer had been stocked with the tender limbs of infants, whose psychosis had been deemed cured by the state—Bonnie Osterman had taken my children.
I remember wailing, curled up like a fetus, rolling on the floor. Bellowing, moaning. And I remember knowing that nothing, no amount of screaming, would help. The unthinkable, unbearable, had happened, and I writhed, each breath knifelike, each body part racked with pain. I don’t know how long that anguished riot continued. I knew I had to call the police about Anna, but I didn’t seem able to move. I remember those moments only in flashes: lying tortured and spent on the floor of Luke’s room. And then, in the stillness of his absence, I imagined I heard whimpering.
Oliver. Oliver was crying somewhere. Probably he’d gotten in the way, nipping the killer’s ankles. Probably she’d shoved him into a closet. I lay, listening to him whine, and it dawned on me that I had to call the police. Get help. Maybe there was hope. Maybe the police could rescue Luke and Molly. I half-crawled, half-stumbled toward my bedroom to get the phone and call 911. But on the way, I passed the bathroom; the door was closed. Oliver was inside, scratching on the door, yipping. Without thinking, I opened the door. Oliver bolted out, jumping on me, licking my legs, but still I heard whimpering, and I looked past the door into the bathroom.
In the darkness, I saw a silhouette—Molly? She was sitting hunched on the floor beside the bathtub—thank God.
“Molly!” I flipped on the light. “Are you all right?”
Her mouth opened, but she didn’t move, made no sound.
“Molly—” I rushed in and reached for her. And that was the last I remembered.
SEVENTY-THREE
Something was squeaking and something wet was tickling my nose. Slowly, I realized several other things: I was cold and uncomfortable, my eyes didn’t want to open, and the base of my head throbbed with pain.
The tickling continued. Okay, I told an eye. Open. It resisted, but I forced the eyelid to lift. And gazed into a dripping line of small jagged fangs. Instantly, I pushed myself up, but oops, I’d moved too fast, and I fell back down, banging onto a hard surface, slamming my head. White pain shot through my skull. But Oliver continued to slobber over me, whining and whimpering. I put a hand on his head, whispering that everything was all right. My hand was wet where I’d touched him, and I glanced at it, saw blood. Oh God. I looked at him, focusing, and gradually realized that the puppy’s mouth and paws were bloody. And as I sat up, more carefully this time, I tried to remember what had happened, how I’d gotten to the bathroom floor.
A small puddle of blood pooled on the floor where my head had been. I touched the base of my skull, felt a gash. Damn. Oliver sat with his paws in the blood, panting, happy that I was on my feet. But I swayed, tottering when I tried to take a step, and my thoughts were jumbled. Then a memory bolted from my chest to my brain: the children. Molly and Luke. And I raced, bumping into the sink, then into the doorknob, moving as fast as I could to the phone. Oh God. Where were they? Had Bonnie Osterman harmed them? Was Molly frightened? Where could Bonnie have taken them? I had to hurry, had to find them before it was too late. Oliver followed me, herding me, and I tripped over him, cursing, dimly aware of a banging sound coming from downstairs. Someone was pounding on the door, ringing the bell. Maybe the police?
I half-slid, half-stumbled down the steps and made it to the door, blood dribbling down my neck. Damn. The cut was beginning to sting, and I was dizzy as I reached for the knob. But I managed to hang on to it long enough to pull it open. And to recognize the furious person standing there, demanding to come in.
SEVENTY-FOUR
“WHAT THE HELL’S GOING on, Zoe? Why did you take off like that?” Susan’s face alternated between anger and alarm. She stepped inside and caught me just as I was fading, about to slide to the floor.
I must have passed out for a second; my next memory was of Susan saying “Good God,” as she pressed a kitchen cloth against the back of my head. “I think you need stitches. What happened? Did you fall?” Under the circumstances, she seemed relatively calm. Too calm. “Where’s Anna? Did she go home?”
Oh. Susan didn’t know. “She’s in the living room.”
Susan looked confused. “Anna!” she shouted. Her voice was loud, jangling.
“No—don’t shout.” I began to explain. “Susan. Anna’s in the wingback—”
“Why? Wait, what are you saying?” Susan cut me off. “Ar
e you saying that Anna did this? She hit you on the head? For God sakes, why?”
I shook my head no. But the motion hurt. “Anna’s dead.”
Susan’s mouth dropped. “What?” She got up and looked into the hall toward the living room, unable to grasp the news.
“Somebody bashed in her head. Susan—” I almost couldn’t say it. “Susan.” My voice became a wail. “Molly and Luke are gone.”
Susan didn’t move. She didn’t speak. She stood frozen, her mouth a horrified oval.
“It was Bonnie Osterman. It had to be. I saw her—”
“Who?” Susan’s mouth still didn’t move.
“From the Institute, she’s psychotic.” I didn’t go into detail, couldn’t manage. “I saw her—”
“She’s here?” Susan spun around, looking behind her.
“No, I saw her in the album. In Eli’s pictures.” I was gulping air, trying to express thoughts that were unthinkable. “She wanted Luke. The whole time I was pregnant, she watched me, kept asking questions about the baby. She was already planning it. Fantasizing about taking him.”
“How can you be sure she—”
“Susan, there are pictures of her following us.” I looked into the hallway. Where had I left the album? “Wait, I’ll show you.” I started to get up to find it, but Susan shoved me back onto the seat.
“Sit down. You’re still bleeding. Have you called nine-one-one? We’ve got to get help for Anna.”
“Dammit, Susan.” Didn’t she get it? The cut on my head—God help me, even Anna didn’t matter right now. “She’s going to kill my babies.” My face was washed with tears.
“Oh God.” Finally, Susan was grasping the situation. Her eyes darted around as if looking for answers. “Okay.” She rattled off words. “Okay. First, we’ll call for help. Then we’ll call the Institute— they’ll have records. They must know where she lives. And we have to call the police. Nick—did you call Nick?” She shoved the towel into my hand, leaving me to apply my own pressure. “Where’s your phone?”
